With a deep interest in improvement of healthcare delivery, Rym is the President of the Space Health Division at Concordia University, and a core member of Space Concordia, where she sits on the executive council. She is also a member of SEDS-Canada and the Canadian Society for Aerospace Medicine Student and Resident Subgroup (CStaRs). At the International level, she is part of the Space Generation Advisory Council where her work has previously involved analog astronaut mission research and is currently involving research on Spaceflight-Associated Neuro-Ocular Syndrome (SANS). Rym is also an active member of the National Chapter of The Mars Society of Canada (MSC) and the Co-Founder & President of the Montreal Chapter, where she also acts as Director of Research & Missions. Within the MSC, she is also the Co-Chair of the new SpaceEx Conference that launched in 2022, an initiative to bridge the gap between industry and academia and discuss the role in Canada’s strategic placement in mission planning.
Rym is currently a Mechanical Engineering student with a focus on astronautics and biomedical engineering at the University of Concordia, where she’s had the honor of being selected as the recipient of the distinguished Petrogiannis Award, celebrating the leading woman in engineering of her undergraduate cohort. In parallel with her studies, she was selected last fall to complete a clinical research internship in space medicine for a first of a kind study in Canada at the McGill Health Research Institute; Under the supervision of the Canadian Space Agency, she studied the effects of inactivity on astronauts and the elderly and she had the opportunity to assist the doctors and researchers in performing muscle biopsies, brain and heart MRIs, and a multitude of physiological and psychological tests. Today, Rym is a very active member of the space medicine community, and she participates in research projects with multiple entities across Canada and around the globe to create advancements and develop remote healthcare technologies for the betterment of medicine for Space and Earth applications.
This year, she was selected as a Zenith Pathways Fellow for a prestigious network of Space Fellowships for the inaugural class of Canada, where she has had the opportunity to work on innovative space projects such as the development of a space center, an astronaut analog training facility and research on space psychology, all the while building the ground for future Canadian students!
Apart from research, Rym is a huge advocate for diversity, equality and accessibility in STEM and has been actively involved with her community. She has been a science communicator and a stem tutor for almost 6 years now, hosting workshops, volunteering and presenting at STEM festivals and conferences, as well as accumulating around 600 hours of private tutoring for academically challenged students and students with learning disabilities. Recently, she has also started acting as a mentor for young female students, with the hope to guide them and empower them throughout their journeys in the male-dominated fields of STEM!
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